Typically, a medication may be dispensed with a regimen according to which a patient is to use that medication. The regimen may be a prescription for treating a patient, instructions for conducting a clinical study, directions for an over-the-counter medication, etc. Certain medications may lose effectiveness, present side effects, etc., if not taken according to the indicated regimen. Also, non-adherence to a regimen may affect clinical study data regarding the effectiveness, safety, etc. of a medication, to a degree that may be unknown and at least potentially significant. (Similarly, certain products other than medications may be dispensed with regimens or analogs thereto.)
Using patient self-reporting to determine adherence may present difficulties if patients do not reliably record the use of the medication; again, the degree of non-adherence may not be known. Use of network-connected systems (also referred to as “smart” systems) to generate authenticated data (e.g., taken automatically by sensors) may avoid some self-reporting issues, but may present other issues. For example, a “smart” medication container with on-board sensors, processor, etc. may be expensive, delicate, environmentally unfriendly, etc. This may be particularly true for medication containers that are used once or a few times and then discarded, such as single-use vials or ampoules of eyedrop medication, single-dose blister packs of pills, single-use hypodermic syringes, etc.
Furthermore, for certain arrangements the actual use of medication may approximate an “instant” event, e.g., it may take a very short time to carry out the specific act of swallowing a pill, instilling an eyedrop, injecting insulin, etc. In such case, tracking the use of the medication in itself may rely upon a relatively brief window of time for detection. If determining medication use requires detecting medication use in real time, e.g., during the actual event of dispensing or swallowing the pill, etc., then even relatively brief interruptions in system function may compromise monitoring. Considering a battery-operated sensor engaged with a pill bottle as an example, if the battery dies then any medication events that take place during the time the battery was dead may go undetected. Similarly, a system that relies on communicating a wireless signal at the time medication is taken may nominally detect the use of medication but still fail to register that use if wireless communication is inoperative for some reason (lack of signal, interference, etc.). As another example, if a patient forgets to carry or deliberately does not carry a medication monitoring device with them for some period of time, then doses of medication taken during that period may not be detected or otherwise registered.
This disclosure presents certain examples and explanations for the purpose of illustration. These examples and explanations should not be construed as exhaustive or limiting.